Fully Integrating Load Response

When deploying its load response solution, Constellation NewEnergy actively engages facilities managers from companies of all sizes to keep a wide range of systems operating efficiently and effectively under a myriad of conditions, including a volatile energy market and a steady increase in capacity costs. To advance this approach further, Constellation NewEnergy is partnering with multiple systems integrators to develop a holistic load response solution that incorporates energy supply and demand information and knowledge onto one comprehensive IT management platform.

Systems integrators already use BAS to manage lighting and HVAC. However, load management and energy efficiency strategies are most effective when all elements of the energy chain are linked together for the customer. Integrating load response onto this platform brings the supply side of the picture into perspective. It puts facility managers, business owners, and building management in a position to leverage both the demand and supply side of the equation. This holistic approach allows an energy team to take full advantage of opportunities in an ever-evolving energy marketplace. Those opportunities include shaping load via control system upgrades and retrofitting, reducing load via advanced load limiting and peak shaving applications, and smoothing bandwidth via optimizing control strategies.

Enhancing the flexibility of a company’s facilities is fundamental to reducing future energy demand and stress on the power grid today. By incorporating load response metering and real-time market pricing into existing energy management techniques and multiple building systems, businesses can elevate energy management well beyond dimming lights or adjusting thermostats.

Access to real-time metering and price information systems, which allow up-to-the-minute views of energy usage and costs and the ability to employ this information to better shape and control usage patterns, puts a business in the driver’s seat of a smarter and more energy responsive building. Fully integrated and intelligent buildings do more than respond to mandatory curtailment demands. These buildings are capable of reacting to changes in the energy marketplace at anytime by shedding load and adjusting consumption to maximize economic efficiency. Intelligent buildings are able to shift electricity consumption from periods of high prices to periods of low prices and reduce overall energy costs in the process.

In today’s competitive business environment, managers and owners are thinking about energy as a strategic asset integral to every aspect of the bottom line. The capacity to actively monitor and manage usage and adjust operations accordingly reflects the increasingly sophisticated energy strategies now available. Load response solutions are particularly attractive to businesses that have already invested in intelligent building designs, and wish to leverage the full spectrum of the energy chain and to maximize energy investment decisions. Constellation NewEnergy is helping customers adapt successfully to this new energy paradigm and positioning them to make the most of the opportunity to participate in the emerging energy marketplace of the 21st century. GIB

Kelly-Detwiler is senior director of energy technology services for Constellation NewEnergy, a leading supplier for commercial and industrial customers.

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